While the presence of squirrels around your home is a common and unalarming sight, they can be a great nuisance to you if you’re growing a fruit and vegetable garden on your property. If you’ve noticed shallow holes, disturbed soil, dug-up bulbs, or even fruits and vegetables with bites taken out of them in your freshly planted, but exposed garden, then your unassuming neighborhood squirrels are the likely culprits. Such signs are just the beginning of the types of damage that squirrels can cause to your property if they are not deterred, removed, or prevented from accessing your home and garden.
If you’re looking for ways to keep squirrels out of your garden, here are a few tips you can try.
10 Squirrel Deterrent Tips for Gardeners
- Shield Your Garden: You can enclose your garden with chicken wire, build a greenhouse for your plants, or even fence off your garden to prevent squirrel attacks.
- Remove Fallen Food: Make sure you clean up any fallen produce and keep your trash can lids sealed.
- Deputize Your Pet: A lot of dogs like to chase squirrels, so you can try using your pooch as a garden watchdog to help keep squirrels at bay.
- Try Using Decoys: Hawks and owls are natural predators for squirrels. By installing lifelike decoy birds around your yard, you can scare the squirrels away and make them think twice about disturbing your garden.
- Deter Squirrels With Bad Smells: If squirrels smell something in your garden that they don’t like, they will be less likely to stick around. Many of the scents that repel deer will also repel squirrels, so deer repellant products will work well. A thin layer of coffee grounds or placing some dog hair around plants might do the trick, as well.
- Startle Them Away: You can surprise squirrels and scare them off by using a motion-activated sprinkler that will spray them with water.
- Plants Squirrel Repellants: You can keep squirrels out of your garden by planting natural squirrels repellants such as mint, marigolds, nasturtiums, and mustard.
- Install a Squirrel Feeder: While this may seem counterproductive, one option is to set out a dedicated squirrel feeder and fill it with sunflower seeds, peanuts, and feed corn. Place the feeder in an area of your yard that is far away from your garden to draw the squirrels away.
- Give Them Water: In some cases, squirrels might be feasting on the juicy fruits and vegetables in your garden because they are thirsty. You can combat this by providing the squirrels with a dish of water or placing a birdbath on the edge of your property, as it might encourage them to leave your garden alone.
- Cover Your Garden Bed: Squirrels don’t like the feel of mulch or gravel, so covering the ground with one of the two can help prevent them from entering your garden.
Professional Squirrel Removal Services in Orlando, Florida
If you’ve tried these methods on how to keep squirrels out of the garden and the squirrels still won’t go away, turn to the professionals at Animal Wildlife Trappers. Our team of licensed animal control specialists is available 24/7 to handle your wildlife emergencies quickly and humanely. No matter what pest is bothering you or your home, we will remove them and offer a three-year guarantee on our services. For a free wildlife removal quote, call us today at 352-267-0546.